NewsWatch: Summary of Top Stories - 7-22-98

CBS.MarketWatch.com

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- U.S. stocks floundered Wednesday, as a second day of profit-taking took the wind out of a market that had relentlessly steamed higher for five weeks. Volume on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange swelled to its highest level in three weeks. The Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA, -0.67%
sank 61.28 points, or 0.7 percent, to 9,128.91. Within the index, Dupont
DD, -3.21%
and Merck
MRK, -0.78%
contributed the most to the decline. "The low close on Tuesday puts the kibosh on the market for the near-term and makes a break below 9,200 on the Dow a real problem," said Robert Dickey, managing director of technical research at Dain Rauscher Wessels.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- For Computer Associates shareholders, Wednesday's scream was just an echo from a year-and-a-half ago. Shares in the third-largest software company (CA)
CA, -0.33%
plunged one-third after the company warned that businesses are expected to order less of CA's mainframe computer software. In its fiscal first quarter, which CA just completed, the company reported stronger-than-expected sales and earnings. The Islandia, N.Y.-based company earned 34 cents per share, 1 cent more than analysts' projections. Sales edged up 18 percent to $1.05 billion.

WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- A Food and Drug Administration panel recommended FDA approval of Isis Pharmaceuticals' Vitravene treatment of AIDS-related blindness with no restrictions, the company said. The drug, known generically as fomivirsen, uses antisense therapy, a new way of attacking a virus's genetic code directly. The technology and the drug was weighed for safety and effectiveness by the FDA's Ophthalmic Drugs Advisory Committee. The FDA has through October to give final approval to the panel's recommendation. Based on past history with the agency, approval by the full FDA is likely, but not guaranteed.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) --Amazon.com (AMZN)
AMZN, +0.99%
posted second quarter sales of $116 million, more than triple those of a year ago, and an operating loss of 33 cents a share, losing money yet still managing to surpass analysts' expectations. Wall Street expected the online seller of books and music to post an operating loss of 40 cents a share for the quarter, according to the analyst consensus estimate compiled by Zacks Investment Research.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- DuPont indicated it's moving to cut costs to meet its target for higher growth and profits by the end of the year. DuPont (DD)
DD, -3.21%
Chief Executive Charles Holliday has called on his top lieutenants over the past week to "focus on how to improve second half performance," the company's chief financial officer said in a conference call after the chemicals giant issued its second-quarter earnings report.

WASHINGTON (CBS.MW) -- U.S. stock indexes fell as Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan repeated his inflation warning to the House Banking Committee. In the second round of his semi-annual Humphrey-Hawkins testimony, Greenspan said inflation remains a bigger risk to the "virtuous cycle" of the U.S. economy than any drag from the Asian depression. Greenspan said the full effects of the Asian crisis haven't been felt yet by the U.S. economy. And he warned that the year-old financial and economic crisis in Asia is far from over.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- PeopleSoft shares slipped amid concern that torrid growth rates at the business software maker may slow just a tad. The Pleasanton, Calif.-based company (PSFT)
PSFT, +0.00%
said it expects sales in the third quarter to be about 60 percent above the previous year's level. That is down from more than 70 percent expansion in recent quarters.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- Although few wine drinkers know the name, Golden State Vintners became the latest premium winery to make its U.S. stock market debut. The company (VINT)
vint
, which owns 9,600 acres in California's Central and Napa valleys, sold 4.3 million shares at $17 each, near the low end of the expected $16-to-$19 price range listed in the company's original filing. Goldman Sachs, which brought Beringer Wine Estates (BERW)
berw
public last fall, is the lead underwriter.

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- As the nation's top banker, Alan Greenspan, laments the swift demand for skilled U.S. workers, one international consultant says American companies have plenty of reasons to exult these days. Productivity gains in Japan and Germany are so far behind those in in the United States, the two countries probably will never catch up, says Ennius Bergsma at McKinsey & Co. in New York.

DALLAS (CBS.MW) -- What the stunning debut of Broadcast.com proves more than anything else is that too many investors have no clue how the IPO process works, a fact backed up by many of the letters posted on the Internet bulletin boards or sent to me via e-mail. If they did, there's no way Broadcast.com (BCST)
bcst
would have closed its first day of trading up nearly 250 percent. (See story on Broadcast.com's IPO.)

LOS ANGELES (CBS.MW) -- The American manager of an all-Japanese stock mutual fund was having a hard time justifying his product, understandable given today's conditions. The financial announcer went for blood. "What's the management of these companies like?" he purred. "Oh, most of them are managed quite well," the manager offered in reply. "But surely not as good as American companies."

SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- As executives from the Pacific Exchange meet to discuss a possible merger with the Chicago Board Options Exchange, they'll be looking to ensure their prized technology option titles get properly valued. The Pacific Exchange (PCX) is the only place dealers can go to get options on Microsoft (MSFT)
MSFT, -1.33%
, Compaq Computer (CPQ)
cpq
, 3Com (COMS)
coms
, WorldCom (WCOM)
wcom
and several other key technology companies. And the exchange, headquartered just north of Silicon Valley, has made technology issues its lifeline.

NEW YORK (CBS.MW) -- What a difference a month makes! On Monday, June 15, traders on Wall Street saw only dark clouds. By day?s end, the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA, -0.67%
had fallen over 200 points to 8628. That represented a one-day drop of 2.3 percent, putting the venerable market index 6.3 percent below its all-time closing high of 9212 set one month earlier. It wasn?t because of market interest rates. It was because of Japan, Russia and the Southeast Asian economies, on the one hand, and tight U.S. labor markets, on the other.

LOS ANGELES (CBS.MW) -- Vanguard founder John Bogle said that "no actively managed fund has outpaced an index fund over the past 15- year period." So why waste time picking actively managed funds? Build your entire portfolio with index funds!Many investors use an indexing strategy.Vanguard?s no-load index funds are a great choice for individual investors ready for this keep-it-simple method of building a successful portfolio.Not one but eight of Vanguard's index funds made the SuperStar top 10 index list:

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